BibleProject - How to Read the Bible Part 2: Is Reading The Bible Together Just a Form of Group Think?

Episode Date: June 9, 2017

This is our second episode in our How To Read The Bible Series. At the beginning (0-21:40) Tim and Jon start the episode talking about how the ancient Hebrew practice of reading the Torah aloud spun out into the New Testament. Jesus himself participated in public readings of Hebrew scriptures, and actually announced his public ministry at one. The second part of the show (21:40-34:36 ) the guys have a fascinating discussion on the sociology and group identity formation elements of Christianity. They discuss ideas by famed sociologist Peter Berger about how humans both create environments and are created by environments. Jon wonders if Christianity is just a social construct or if there is something real to gather around. In the final part of the show (34:36-End) Tim shares part of an essay by N.T. Wright called “How is the Bible Authoritative?” Tim and Jon discuss the differences between stories and facts, how stories have a different kind of power than facts, and why it’s more powerful to view the Bible as a story, not as a rulebook. This show is designed to accompany our new video on reading Scripture together in a community. You can check it out on our Youtube page here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BO1Y9XyWKTw Show Resources: The Didache - early Christian manual on discipleship. Wikipedia Resource. Desiring The Kingdom. By James Smith. The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge. By Peter Berger The Sacred Canopy: Elements of A Sociological Theory of Religion. By Peter Berger. Essay: How Is The Bible Authoritative? By N.T. Wright Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. By Yuval Noah Harari Show Music: Defender Instrumental by Rosasharn Music The Size of Grace by Beautiful Eulogy Conquer by Propaganda

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

Hey, this is John with the Bible Project Podcast, and today I'm going to continue talking with Tim on this biblical theme of reading the Bible together out loud. Last episode we talked about the history of ancient Israel, how they read the Torah out in their community, and today we're going to look at how that practice continued on into the New Testament with Jesus. Jesus who actually announced his public ministry during a public greeting of Scripture. In this episode we're going to talk about key practices in the early church that helped that group form their identity. Practices including communion also

knows last supper, but also this practice of reading the letters of the New Testament allowed as a group. Because you want to hear by yourself, like the Bible is weird, but then when we're a group together, we're like, yeah, this is our story. And we're going to live by this story, and I find the Christian worldview more believable. You know, as a skeptical person, sometimes this whole thing feels a little bit like just group think for brainwashing. And I asked him about that too. It is a form of identity formation called brainwashing, but the point is that the person poking holes in that is themselves exposing themselves constantly to a different form of brainwashing, of just a different story about the world.

And of course the question is which of those stories offers a better account of the human experience and of reality. So if you've ever wondered about what early church services look like, if Christianity might be some weird group therapy, stay tuned. Here we go. So out of Ezra Neomyaz practice comes a practice that went two ways in Jewish tradition in Middle Eastern. Ezra Neomyaz practice. Ah, of.

Yeah, well, they revive this practice. They read of it and then they ask all the people to renew their commitment to the covenant. Okay. And then what the story is, and the rest of Neomyhemiah go on to show is, and it didn't really work, people didn't really stay faithful, but that's another matter. But historically this practice went on. So Babylonian, Middle Eastern Jewish communities, from later Jewish texts, the mission and the Talmud, have this practice, this synagogue synagogue practice of gathering on the evening of Sabbath or Shabbat,

and over the course of one year, they'll have read the entire Torah aloud in those synagogue gatherings. All the way back in Israel, Palestine, Jewish community is taking three and a half years. So this practice developed in two different ways. So it's shorter readings and then a practice developed where they would combine that shorter reading from the Torah with a selection from the prophets or the Psalms or the wisdom books. It's the early electionary. This is what became the electionary practice and Christianity of reading from... ...section of the whole kind of high church. That's right. Yeah, for the most part.

Yeah. So the practice went diverse directions in Jewish history after the Biblical period. But it's been a practice with in Jewish history all along, just the public reading of Scripture. So this is what's moving forward into the New Testament? So there's no Jewish tradition where they just every seven years on the Feast of Booth actually just read through. That's a good question. There's no like acidic.

There's no like acidic Jews would do. Yeah, we keep that going. I'm not as much off the top of my head about more modern Jewish practices like that. There's nothing in the second temple period. Okay. We go to Ezra Niyamaya and then out into the spread of the diaspora Jewish communities around Babylon and Israel and these other practices develop.

So this is the setting that Jesus and the apostles are all a part of. So does that story in Luke, chapter four, Jesus goes to synagogue. On the Sabbath. On the Sabbath. And the School of Isaiah is open and handed to him. So they must be in that part. Yeah. So the Torah reading's already been done. Now this is the reading of the prophets. Yeah. And so whether he just neglected the order and chose Isaiah 61. Or that's where they happened.

Or whether it happened to be Isaiah 61, you know, we're not told. He's like, oh, we're in Isaiah 61, perfect. Perfect, let me tell you guys that this is being fulfilled in your hearing. There's a couple other mentions of it, like when Paul and Barnabas go out on the first missionary journey, they're sent out by the church in Antioch, and they go to a town in modern day Turkey called Pasidian Antioch. And on the Sabbath, they entered the synagogue and sat down after the reading from the Torah and the prophets. The leaders of the synagogue said, hey, you guys are new to town. Give us a short word of exhortation.

So the scriptures have been read. That was a typical thing in the synagogue. Yeah, well think back to that, Ezra and Iamai practice. So you have reading the scriptures and then expositing them, giving them sin. And there wasn't like one person who gets to do that, necessarily? Yeah, that's right, yeah. Yeah, it's, um,

it wasn't just the rabbi who gets to do that. Well, there it was, you have the priests and Levites in Ezra Niyamai, but there's no rules about who can read. Okay. And so when it goes out, and it's synagogue practice, anybody can get up and read like Jesus can, or Paul and Barnabas, after the reading are invited, there's a new guys in town, some new brothers, you know, New Kinsmen of ours. And so they invite them, give us a word of exhortation based on the scriptures that we

just read. And what Paul gets up is he does a whole retelling of the story of the Old Testament, leading up to the Messiah, and then he says, and the Messiah is... And they're kind of like, whoa, we didn't expect that. We didn't expect that. Yeah, right. But it shows this is the same practice. It's the origins of the sermon in Jewish Christian tradition. When in my small church ministry experience, you do not let people get up on stage and start

exposing scripture without open mic time is open mic. It's totally not. It's really cool. It goes wrong. I mean, even in in a small group setting, if you turn to someone and say, cool, now what do you think? What might happen?

Something like someone's gonna have some crazy thing to say. Why is that such a fear? Oh, that's interesting. There are some... There's some crazy people, right? Oh, yeah. There's that.

There's people who are just like, they're just waiting, totally, because they have this thing they're obsessed with, and they're just waiting for an opportunity to obsess about it without allowed. Yeah, yeah, many people have been in those awkward home groups or Bible studies where there's the person who just hijacks the whole world.

Can you just imagine like Barnabas being like one of those guys and like they're there in Antioch, and they and they're like your new brothers and also they're like talking about space aliens And all the other things ever invited that guy up here. Yeah, yeah, no to self do not let Barnabas six positive Yeah, maybe they knew some people there. I don't know so Early Christianity develops in this setting of weekly gatherings Yeah, where the Scriptures are read aloud and there's a short exposition of them or word of exhortation. So here's what's interesting.

So Jesus and the Apostles as they went into Jewish settings did this. As the followers of Jesus started to form their own worship gathering around not around Sabbath, but around Resurrection morning, which is Sunday morning. They would gather in homes and eat a meal together and take the bread and the cup together. So instead of going to the temple, or no, where would synagogue be? Well, synagogue would be, where would synagogue be?

synagogue would be on Friday nights. And it would be, and there was a specific place. Yeah, it would be, yeah, at the synagogue. At the synagogue. Yeah, building doesn't gain. So Christians didn't have any of their own buildings and steadicating. And they're not gonna crash the Jewish-Tinigogs on.

Yeah, so maybe you might have some Jewish- It is not like the Korean church saying, like, hey, you guys don't use this building on Saturday night. Can we, can we piggyback? There's no stories about that. All the evidence in the New Testament is that they met in people's homes, because it was all about a meal. Everything focused around replaying the Lord's supper together.

Every time. And then we get a window in Paul's letter to the Corinthians that during the meal and afterward somebody would bring a word, a prophecy, somebody would bring a teaching and multiple people would contribute to the sharing time over after the meal. That's the early Christian gathering. So there wasn't just reading scripture. It certainly played a part but yeah there's more happening. Okay. At least in the house churches that Paul started. But it's interesting, because at the end of two of his letters, he talks about the reading of the reading aloud of

something, and what it is is his letters. So at the end of his letter to the Thessalonians, one Thessalonians chapter 5, he says, I charge you before the Lord to have this letter read aloud to all the brothers and sisters. At the end of Colossians, he says, after this letter has been read to you, see that it's also read in the church down the road of the layout of Sien's. And in turn, get the letter I vote to them and read that. Which we don't have.

Read that to you. We don't have it unless it's the letter to the Ephesians. It's also the letter to the lay out of the sands. It's just interesting rabbit hole. We don't have time for it there. So we know that Paul intended his letters to be read aloud the same way that they would be reading aloud.

Other sacred texts of the scriptures. So, started being that picky. Sorry. How do we know they were reading? They were continuing the tradition of reading the Torah. And first Timothy, in the directions, this is the third important passage, when Paul writes to Timothy, who's a pastor that he stationed in Ephesus,

Paul wants to come help Timothy out with a bunch of pastoral problems. But he says, until I come, keep devoting yourself to the public reading of Scripture and to preaching and to teaching. So between all of this, Paul's having his own letters read aloud, but also in these house church gatherings, we're having just Scripture read aloud, Which at the time he's writing Timothy doesn't refer to the New Testament because it's just starting those writings are just coming into existence. He's referring to the Old Testament scriptures.

Yeah. So based off of that verse, we know there was the public reading, the Christians were continuing reading it aloud. Yeah. They both picked that but also developed this Jewish practice of reading the Old Testament scriptures aloud, probably in Greek, for many of these people. And that along with the scriptures, Paul's letters are being read aloud, which, you know, the issue of that he viewed his letters as having the same kind of covenant authority.

Almost certainly somebody would be reciting from oral memory, large sections of the sermon on the mount or something like that, teachings of Jesus. And then also, as the Spirit led people, what he talks about in 1 Corinthians 12 through 14 of the Spirit prompting people to share something they feel like I'd want to say to their church community. This is all happening. It's a very active gathering. Yeah. Over a meal. Yeah. At that. Yeah. It seems like would they be actually be at a meal the whole time? Oh, good point. I mean, I want to do a think of like gatherings that we host in our home. Yeah. After a while you go back to living.

Yeah, we have to be able to gather and we're talking. And then we put the dishes away and go to the living room and we just keep talking. Yeah. We pray for each other and we don't sing. We don't sing a song. There's Christians who are really interested in how the early church actually performed worship service or the gathering. Yeah, yeah. Because of the belief that the way that it was done in the early church is the way it should

always be done. Yeah. And so if we could figure out what they were doing, that's the way we should be doing church. We don't have to get into whether or not that's a valid assumption. But how much can we actually know exactly what was being done? Because it seems like we're just getting these little piecemeal things. And who knows, you know, like it would have been done one way in a Jewish environment. And then it probably would have been done, you know, because they

have all the synagogue background, right? So it would have been highly adapted from the way that they were used to doing synagogue. They changed the day, but they're still going to have all of that tradition to fall back on. But then you go to a city that's not Jewish, and they don't have that. The majority of the followers of Jesus are Greeks and Romans. They don't have all this synagogue background, and maybe some of it was imported in a little bit from the missionaries that came and told them about Jesus. They have the public reading of the scriptures.

Like the public reading scriptures. But the Jewish practice that gets adopted into these non-German churches. But they'll probably bring their own flavor of the way that they're used to gathering into. Yeah, yeah, that's right. That's right. So the kind of assumption I would have is that it probably looks very different their own flavor of the way that they're used to gathering. Yeah, that's right. And to, too. That's right. So, the kind of assumption I would have is that it probably looks very different in every

single gather. Depending on the city and on the house community, house church community. Yeah, I think that's right. Yeah, there's no manual of worship gathering in the writings of the Apostles. One of the earliest post-New Testament documents that claims to represent the way worship and teaching was done in the New Testament errors called the Didake, which is just a Greek word for teaching or instruction. And it's a little manual of discipleship from the early church. It's really interesting. Mostly, some of it's like how to perform

baptisms and the kind of cataclysm or instruction new converts are to be given. You pray the Lord's Prayer every morning and every night. You fast once a week. For hell all day, one whole day. Every day, one day a week, you don't eat to dedicate yourself to prayer. So, really, it's a little window into early Eastern Christianity. But even that doesn't give you the... That's where a couple generations are. Yeah, totally. Yeah, we're decades out from the era of the Apostles.

And this gets us more into controversial territory, you know, because both the Catholic tradition, the Eastern Orthodox tradition, may acclaim that the mass, the liturgies of the mass have ancient roots that go all the way back to the period of the apostles, and so people just have debates about these kinds of things. But essentially, we don't have anything like the apostle describing what the worship gathering ought to look like. But essentially, we don't have anything like the Apostle describing what the worship gathering ought to look like. The only thing we know for certain is that it was a meal, which at some point reenacted the last supper, the Passover meal. And it was always a meal. Is that right?

Well, we don't have any indication that these references to meals were anything other than a terrible meal. It's just so weird for me, for some reason that's so shocking. And I think it's because that's so rare, and just my group, and it's to actually have a meal. Like that might happen once a year, it's like the church potluck. Potluck, yeah, totally.

And it's a bunch of work and like, but so like 1% of the gatherings involves a meal. But so every gathering involved a meal, that just seems crazy, but I guess. But it was a house. You gotta eat in your own house. Yeah, it was a house-based movement. The central symbol of the gathering

was reenacting the bread and the cup. Which has the same kind of influence that reading scripture allowed should have, which is let's remember. Yeah, and we discover also the reading aloud of the scriptures, of the writings of the prophets and then the apostles. Taking the bread and the cup together, which is food, so it's in the context of a meal, and then the reading aloud of the

apostles and prophets. They never just, like, said, hey, we've already eaten, or some of us will eat when we leave, so let's just take little bits of bread and like little sips of wine. Well, this was a problem, this is a huge problem in the churches and Corinth that Paul lays into them for, because there's no Sabbath in the Roman world. So if you're wealthy, you could come early to the meal and they would eat all the food and have drunk all the wine. Before later people who had to work, and then they get to work later, Paul calls them those who have not come.

And everybody else is already a little tipsy because they spend too much of one. You know, and Paul's just like, what? This is, you call this the worship gathering? He thinks it's a sham. So anyway, he's laying into them, but he gives us at least some clues that like, yeah, people getting there at different times and so interesting. And then later on, first Corinthians 14, he says, what do we say?

Brothers, when you guys come together, different ones of you, one has a hymn to share, one has a word of instruction to teaching, one has a prophecy, a tongue, or interpretation, that's a whole lot of thing. And Paul says, yeah, everybody contributes so the community can be built up. And then he gives instructions about how tongues and prophecy works, because the Corinthians

were getting out of control. So would it have been possible during these early gatherings then since there's so many elements now that there would be times where scripture wasn't read? Oh, interesting. So before it was like, that's all, you got together, you read the scripture, you did a little bit of exposure. Sure, sure.

And then that was it. And now it seems to have more of such a degree, it's like you got a meal. Someone brings a hymn, someone I have a prophecy. There might be all these different things. And then it's like, guys, we ran out of time and we haven't cracked the scroll. Yeah.

We just don't have, we don't have the manual. We don't. All we have is these little tidbits in the New Testament itself. Okay. And then the later from later post. It just feels like it went from such like the B thing to now one of many things.

I understand. Yeah, that's interesting. Is that the case? That's the of many things. I understand. Yeah, that's interesting. Is that the case? That's the case. Yeah, it seems to be that the bread and the cup becomes more important. It becomes, yeah, the center symbol. But we all know that the reading of scripture and the reading of the prophets and apostles to our prophets and apostles, was also a part

of what Paul had happened in his house. And he told Timothy not to neglect it. Told Timothy, yeah, make sure you keep reading scriptures aloud to people. So it starts to sound more like a church gathering, except maybe a more modern setting. The bread and the cup have become disconnected from an actual meal from most communities.

And I still don't understand the Protestant tradition of having the bread and the cup just like once a month. It's utterly bizarre to me. And that's, I was, I- Well, when it's not a meal, it's kind of a weird thing to do every week. Kind of, but, but it's such a crucially talk about identity formation. Yeah Because the bread and the cup are a you're eating the story instead of reading aloud

They're consuming you're consuming the story. Yeah, you're engaging in it in a really powerful way that reminds you of who you are and who Jesus is and and with a kind of life that I'm called to, and that gets you to look backwards. You know, like in Josiah, we look back, and we lament the ways that we haven't been faithful, and then like Joshua, you look forward to the new horizon that lay ahead, and what kind of person the story makes you into. And that's really what this is about.

The public reading of scripture, whether it's connected to a worship gathering, or whether it's a more of a one-off thing like Injoshua's Day, the whole point is identity formation. It's the creation of reality for people. And that's really a goal. Yeah, I, you know, you're really interested in this, like, the history of the worship gathering in the hearts of the... Oh, sorry.

No, it's okay. Oh, man. I know. I act now that I think about it. It's like, oh, of course, you would be interested in this. Because you want, it's context for you. Yeah. And it's like, how did we get

like? Well, I would be afraid to like make of such a stand of like how important. Also, I just started getting this sense of, oh yeah, the Lord's Supper actually is probably more important than reading scripture allowed in the early tradition. I see. And maybe, and that was the thing that you wouldn't, you would always do. Yeah. And actually reading scripture was really important. But that could you could maybe miss. But you wouldn't not. Yeah. Eat the meal. Yeah. Yeah. I see. I see. I'm also very interested in identity formation, and I've thought a lot about, and read about how our identity is shaped by our myths. And in particular, trying to think through that

in a modern context of like, what are the myths that we are told and reenact? And by myth, you mean in the technical sense of like a foundation story. Whether or not it's rooted in historical events or not isn't the point. Yeah. It's about, it's a story,

being it's the shape, your sense of who you are, and your role in the world. Yeah, and for Americans, there is, there's certain stories that really form an American identity. A lot of them are these Western stories. You get these Clint Eastwood characters. That becomes a sort of mythology of the self-made, take care of yourself kind of guy.

There's the American dream entrepreneurial myth. I don't mean myth in that, yeah, it's not true. It's just, yeah, a story that defines who you are. Yeah, it's how sociologists use the word myth. It's how sociologists use the word myth. Regardless of whether it's anchored in historical events or not, a mythical myth, or a historical myth, function in the same way.

Yeah, I mean, maybe there's a better word that doesn't need this kind of. I think it's a good word. But yeah, when you're saying that for America, I think even both of those are rooted in an older one, which is like the liberation freedom narrative, freedom from the British rule. And so it's the. Yeah, we celebrate that. We've carved out who we are in this new place.

We won't tolerate this oppression of these institutions from our past. The self-made reality that assumes freedom and liberty of the individual and that kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah, these are core narratives in American culture. Yeah, and we don't really think of them as, like when we think of myths, we think of, oh, what, like Greek people told each other back in 2000 BC, I don't know about Zeus and different things. And yeah, those were myths that shaped their identity, but then there's myths that shape

our identity. And then there's also practices that we have these kind of like almost liturgical practices of like, I guess this doesn't happen as much anymore, but growing up for me was like going to the mall. It's like a liturgy, it was like you like, it becomes the temple and it's the way where you gather and it's all around. Yeah, and the story is.

Yeah, and the story is about consumption. Yeah. And about identity of what you're wearing and you're around. Yeah. Yeah, so that becomes part of the mythos. There's one of the most important sociologists of the 20th century was again named Peter Berger. And it's most significant significant book was called the social construction of reality.

And then his follow-up volume was called the sacred canopy. And in both of these books, he re-shaped the whole study of anthropology and human culture and so on. And his basic point was the story of human civilization, first of all, it's the claim that he made that no human experiences reality in some kind of pure form vacuum. But that every human is already born into a particular interpretation of the world through a thousand forms of media and socialization and family and so on.

And it's like this metaphor, but I found helpful of the fish swimming in water. So like the tropical fish, who by nature has been shaped as a being to inhabit warm shallow waters among a reef and then like a shark that inhabits the deep, cold, cold, dark waters. They have no framework if you were to ask them, oh, how do you like these warm shallow waters? Yeah, what's your opinion? Yeah, what's your opinion about the deep waters out there? And you know, of course the tropical fish is like a wet water.

Yeah. Like what do you mean? What? Yeah, what is water? What is water? What do you mean shallow? That's just reality. And so his point was that's exactly how human cultures are.

But paradoxically, humans create those environments. So we are both the creators of those environments and we are also created by them. And we have the intelligence to then step back and talk about them in a meta kind of way. Yes, totally. It's really interesting. So the sacred canopy was about the how religious communities do this for people. Anyway, as this interesting process that he talks about how it's this constant replaying cycle of Humans, he calls it externalization where we create something to help shape our environment like a create the mall That's a human creation right within recent history, but then he calls it objective occasion that this This institution he calls it hardens

Mm-hmm and then people just begin to take it for granted. And then within a few generations, the mall isn't something humans created. It's now something that's creating humans. Yeah. So this is fascinating. Yeah. So every's inhabiting the world by already being created with some vision of who we are, the story we're in. And so how does this relate to the public reading of Scripture? The public reading of Scripture in the story of the Bible is completely wrapped up with this sense of forming identity. It's supposed to be that thing that forms you.

It's like when the mall's been around so long and you become a part of it, it's now forming your identity just by participating in the exercise of going to it. Yeah, it acts on you. Yeah, it acts on you. Yeah, and that's exactly the role that the scriptures have played throughout their history. That's why they came into existence, was to retell the story of what God has done to save and redeem of people, and then to invite those people into a covenant relationship and to a new way of life. And the question is, how do you sustain that way of life when it's not the norm, and that's precisely what this, the role of this scripture is. And it's why the public reading allowed of the scriptures

has played such an important role throughout Jewish and Christian history. And there's something that happens there that's intangible. So when you have one verse up on a screen and a sermon is given, that can be every powerful way of reflecting on a biblical truth in a depth that you've never experienced it. But there's also something about hearing the whole story of the Exodus from chapter one to chapter 15, read aloud to you. And it raises all these crazy questions.

But you walk away like challenged with the view of the world and you get to think and go like, oh yeah, who's is really in control around here? God or Pharaoh? And you start to think of, oh yeah, I think I told you the story of Roman. He watched the whole project video about, you know what, part one? Yeah, and he and I got in some conflict.

I was asking him to do something, like come to dinner and put his legos away and he didn't want to, he's five. He got really ticked off. And it escalated to the point of essentially, like, don't tell me what to do. And I was like, buddy, like, that there's sometimes where I just need you to do what I'm asking you to do. And then he brought Jesus into it. And he would, he would got angry with me. And it was like, I want you to be out of my, this is way of dissing me. and it was like, I want you to be out of my family. This is way of dissing me. He would say, I want you to be out of my family.

Yeah, Paxton says it too. Yeah, then he said, I'm going to tell Jesus what to do. I'm going to kill Jesus. I want to be like Herod. Wow. It's taking control. And I was like, well, he's being honest. It's a, a stuit.

He's being honest, but he's using the biblical story to express what he feels. And he can tell this is a moment where I don't want to follow Jesus, I want to tell him what to do. In fact, I want to eliminate any opposition to my will. And Herod is what came to his mind. It becomes the language that we use to describe our experience.

So totally. Totally. Yes. Yes. And that's another beautiful thing then is that as a community you have a common set of ideas and images and pictures to express yourself and to interpret things. And it just, it bonds you too as well. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I wasn't pleased with how he was treating me in that moment. So we had to work through that moment, work through the consequences. Yeah.

All right. But imagine when he does that someday because of some profound truth or moment of expressing his gratitude for something. Yeah. And he's using the biblical imagination to express it. Correct. Correct. Yeah. I didn't teach him. We just read the story of Luke at dinner

that I was doing with Christmas season and he watched the Luke video. And now that's the framework for helping him understand his experience. That insight by what's his name, Burger? Burger, Peter. We both create these structures, and then the structures create us.

Yeah. Is such a great insight when it comes to how we're gonna live our lives. I feel like in the people I read as outside of Christianity who are talking about business, and different things start up culture, entrepreneurial culture. A lot of it is just about habits and like psyche and things to just make yourself a better person, more productive, happier,

all these different things. A lot of self-help kind of stuff. Just that insight of when you create structure in your life, that structure is then gonna recreate you. Yes, or like on anything. Yeah. And then specifically thinking of it as, well, I wanna follow Jesus, then putting structure in your life

where you listen to the Bible being read is going to create who you are. Yeah, it's one piece of a larger set of habits that has historically played a really important role in shaping who are. In shaping God's people. The Lord's Supper being another one. Yep.

And then here we go out into the whole Christian spiritual tradition. It's really amazing. In Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant expressions of spiritual tradition. It's really amazing in Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant expressions of spiritual practices. You know, of what at hospitality and generosity, of silence and solitude, of having, building these rhythms in your life, that sustain a healthy follower Jesus over the long haul. And historically, yeah, hearing the scriptures are read aloud has this intangible effect in the human imagination.

It's basically the saying, you are what you eat, right? Is that saying, kind of getting at you, what you listen to. You are what you listen to. What you, yeah. Yeah, you become what you listen to. Yeah, yeah, that's a fairly simple and profound way of putting it A number of years ago, just one of the few rock star seaologians living today who are now on the outside of nerdy theology circles, again, named NT Wright.

What is really interesting, SA, called How, is the Bible authoritative. He begins by saying, the Bible is fundamentally a long narrative, not a law book. And what does it mean for a long narrative to be a divine authority in your life? And in the conclusion of the essay, it has this great statement, he says, this I think is one of the reasons why God has given us so much story, so much narrative in Scripture. Because story authority is the authority that really works, because stories determine how we see ourselves, others, and the world, and how we experience God. If you throw a rule book at someone's head, or offer them a list of doctrines they can duck or avoid it or simply disagree in one way. But you tell them a story. You invite them into a community of people living by that

story, and you're inviting them into a different world. You invite them to share a whole new worldview. And when someone enters into the gospel story and finds out how compelling it is, it begins to quietly shatter that worldview that they were in beforehand. And then there's no telling what can happen when God himself breathes new lives and new worlds into being through his word. So, he's kind of combining this Peter Berger observation with this ancient practice of Scripture reading and the story of the gospel. There's actually a really formative essay for me many years ago where I resonated deeply

with that because that was my experience. Even I'm going to this outreach ministry to escape borders and just hearing the stories of Jesus talked about or read aloud or the teachings of Jesus and they or read aloud or the teachings of Jesus, and they quietly worked on me. Yeah, the quietly were years. We were years. For years. That's, and that's,

just like the story of Luke has been quietly working on my son's imagination. And I think that perspective is what was lost for me. And what I think I picked up on being lost in my tradition was the way we did sermons and lessons and different things, it's always about a very quick, like razor sharp. Here's what you got to believe and do, do it, make the decision, make the change, and it's very decisive, very quick.

Instead of the slow burn of it forming your imagination slowly and appreciating that. And it's still what happened that way, but there was no space to just let that be and to appreciate that. It was always about what's the next very decisive doctrine or application. And I wrote an essay about how story is powerful and the metaphor that came to mind was the difference between a knife and a son So like a knife is sharp and decisive and you can really clearly articulate something or systematize something quickly But the power of a son it's very different it slowly, it takes millions of years to form.

But once it gets heated up, it gets so hot and radiant, and it just starts to affect everything, and then it has its own gravity that everything gets attracted to it. You know, it's a different kind of power. It's not fast, and it's not so decisive, but it's much more powerful. Yeah, it's more permeating. It's more permeating. The energy. The energy's permeating. It also has a gravitational force that pulls things to itself. And the same way a good story creates a world where everything gets pulled into that way of looking at things. It gives you this framework that you can now fit all your experiences into this.

So I could quickly give you a bunch of doctrines or rules. Yes, yes. And that's quick, it's decisive. It might make a change right now. But if it hasn't really like forms your imagination, or your values. And your values. What your identity.

Yeah. The theologian James Smith, imagination, where are your values and your values? What your identity? Yeah, the Theologian James Smith Desiring the kingdom and then he wrote another book called you are what you love more recently And it's yeah, the whole point is that Christian discipleship is about taking an active role in shaping what you love So he focuses not just on the imagination, but on your affections What you desire what you want what you want. So he focuses not just on the imagination but on your affections, what you desire, what you want, what you want out of life, what gets you most excited, what you'll make sacrifices for. You do this for things that you love. And he thinks that Christian

discipleship is about creating environments and communities that through habits begin reshaping what we love. And there are Christian traditions that do that well, I'm sure. Yeah, totally. Transcend the Sunday Gathering. Sunday Gathering can play a role, but it's just one role in a much larger way of life. And the scriptures have a huge role to play in that too. It's freeing for me to value that because the measurement of success is a lot more obscured.

One is a son being successful. It's like, you know when a knife has been working well and it's made a good cut or something. But a son is just, you get all these trillions and trillions of these particles coming together and then as they get so packed in, it like ignites and it turns into like a new. But just as this slow formation of, yeah, your affections, your imagination, it's harder to measure.

To bring back to something earlier, it changes, in this case, it changes the role of the scriptures from being this thing that we act upon to something that acts upon us. You have to read it, but then metaphorically speaking, it also is reading you. Right. And you find yourself addressed by this word, this ancient word. And it's why this is true to my own experience. When the scriptures are read aloud, when I'm with the gathering followers of Jesus, I'm more compelled on a personal level than when I'm sitting by myself reading. That's just my experience. And when I'm by myself, I'm compelled in a different way. It's usually very different, but there's something about standing or sitting next to a bunch of

other people in my community, and I'm like, yeah, we're trying to follow Jesus together. And then it actually makes it more believable to me. Because you want to hear by yourself, at least this is kind of our inner skeptics speaking. But you know, you're kind of like, okay, that's really challenging. Right. Well, that God did that and that story or what, you're reading is kind of weird, like the Bible's weird. But then when we're a group together, we're like, yeah, this is our story. And we're going to live by this story.

And it's the, we've created the church is the creation of an environment that then begins to create us. And I find the Christian worldview more believable when I'm with other Christians. Then the scriptures play a role in that. And that's important, I think, to recognize. I'm imagining someone really skeptical as things conversation and going, well, it sounds like what you're talking about is just brainwashing. And I guess you kind of have to start with, are you going to follow Jesus? And then, and you believe that the Bible has some sort of divine authority in your life. You kind of have to get there first before you can say that it's important

to let it work on you. Yeah, but even underneath that, it is a form of identity formation, called brainwashing, but the point is that the person poking holes in that is themselves exposing themselves constantly to a different form of brainwashing, of just a different story about the world.

And of course, the question is, which of those stories offers a better account of the human experience and of reality. And so it is, you know, you can use uncharitable terms like brainwashing, but it's the social construction of reality. It happens with everything. Happens with everything. The modern, western story is also It's what I really construction of reality. I really loved about that book Sapiens

I think I thought I before is the guy who wrote that his name's escaping me He talks about how many of our just normal cultural Practices are constructs. I don't think about like money cultural Practices our constructs. I don't think about like money Money doesn't it actually exists like what is money sure sure? It's a construct. It's a total construct. Yeah, we just all believe in it. Yeah, but it's yeah It's make believe perceived that absolute make believe abstract perceive. Yeah, totally and we're totally fine with it Yeah, it's we've been brainwashed to believe that it's valuable

Totally fine with it. Yeah. It's fine. Because we've been brainwashed to believe that it's valuable. Same thing with like democracy or different things, it's like, Or social positions, like social capital, where I have achieved these credentials

or I had this experience. Yeah. And now there's a value and a weight and an authority that I can use to my benefit or whatever. Yeah, these are all based off of the, essentially the myths that we believe in the... About what's valuable. Yeah, that's what matters.

I just had a breakfast with somebody who grew up in South Africa this morning and he was talking about veterans, how in South Africa everybody's serves. Oh yeah. It's just a part of everybody's story there. Like many countries. veterans, how in South Africa everybody serves. Oh yeah. It's just a part of everybody's story there. Like many countries, you get out of high school

and you serve in the military. But he's talking about when he moved to America, that was one of the things he noticed was. Some people did, some people did. Yeah, but how veterans who volunteered, it becomes this social honor. Anyway, that's a different narrative, a different mythology.

Yeah, that we all just about military service. We agreed to believe. And that creates value. So the question becomes, what is actually reality? What is reality? And that's the tricky. And you can describe it in terms of math and math in chemistry, but even that itself is just one aspect of reality. That's the tricky. And you can describe it in terms of math and math and chemistry.

But even that itself is just one aspect of reality. Right. Yeah. So humans by nature, and this Genesis 1 rule the earth, subdue it, create, like shape the creation, take the raw potential within it, and then make new creation out of it that you will then inhabit. And think about what money as a construct has done to then shape us as people. Yes. You go back to the burger inside. Yeah, right. Like we've created this thing that didn't exist and now it works on us and it shapes us.

So all to say, scripture, reading scripture allowed as identity formation. Like the work you have to do is show up, right? Yeah. And then let it work on you. That's right. And you know, you can put a lot of energy into a church worship gathering and architecting that to bring people into an encounter with Jesus through the scriptures and the bread and the cup. But there's another way that you can do an addition that's much simpler.

Yeah. And that's what we're interested in. Thanks for listening to the Bible Project podcast. If you've been enjoying these podcast episodes, one way you could help us a lot is by giving us a review on iTunes. Another way you can help is go to our website at thebibeproject.com and just check out all the other stuff we've got going on. We've got free videos and resources and

we have a growing number of supporters who make this whole project possible. So thank you. If you're encouraged to maybe try to bring some people together to do some reading of scripture in a group, we'd love to know how it goes. Remember, you don't have to do a sermon, or it doesn't even have to really be a sharing time, just get some people together and read through a book of the Bible, could be a short one to begin with, and let the slow burn of those words work on your hearts and minds. We'd love to hear stories. If you do it, you can email us at support at jointhebubbleproject.com and we're on Twitter

at join the Bible Project. And we're on Facebook, Facebook.com slash the Bible Project. Thanks for being a part of this with us. 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1%, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1 %, 1, 1%, 1 %, 1, 1, 1%, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1 you you